A new statewide poll released today to coincide with President Obama’s trip to Colorado shows the first-term Democrat is more popular than any of his major GOP presidential challengers, particularly among unaffiliated voters and Hispanics, two crucial groups.

New West released its poll.

Project New West’s poll, which was conducted late last month, also shows that the Republican electorate in the state appears dissatisfied with the current field.

“At this point in the presidential race, President Obama is running against himself,” Project New West president Jill Hanauer said today. “At the same time, the Republican field is not reaching a majority of Coloradans due to their extreme views in very centrist state where voters vote for the person not the party and the policy vision, not a political ideology.”

The pollster conducted 500 live operator telephone interviews from Sept. 19-22 among likely November 2012 voters statewide in Colorado. The margin of error was +/- 4.3%. The margin of error among only Republican voters is +/- 7.2%, according to the Project New West, which wrote this about its poll:

PNW’s poll showed that 49% of likely Colorado voters view the President in a positive light, compared with 45% who have a negative opinion of him. Comparatively, Mitt Romney has a 40/38 favorable/unfavorable rating, and Rick Perry is underwater with a 29/38 rating.

Importantly, the President is even more popular with unaffiliated voters, who constitute a crucial 29% of the Colorado electorate. 54 percent of unaffiliated voters have positive feelings about the president, compared with 37% who view him negatively. Romney (38/37) and Perry (24/33) have similar ratings among Unaffiliateds as they do with the broader electorate.

The President also remains popular with Hispanic voters, who made up roughly 12% of the Colorado electorate in 2010. 2 Obama has a 59/36 approval/disapproval rating among Colorado Hispanics, compared to 31/35 for Romney and 28/39 for Perry.

PNW’s poll also showed that Republican candidates have work to do in winning over their own voters, in addition to unaffiliateds and Hispanics.

Just 44% of likely Republican 2012 caucus voters would have caucused for one of the two front-runners — Perry and Romney — when the poll was conducted. No other candidate received more than 7% support among Republicans, with 19% undecided. Mitt Romney, the winner of nearly 6 out of 10 delegates in the 2008 Colorado Caucuses, was leading the pack with just 24%. Perry was second with 20%, followed by Newt Gingrich and Michele Bachmann with 7% and Herman Cain with 5% [the poll was conducted immediately before Herman Cain’s recent ascendance].

Actually, he is not more popular. He is just better than the leads over at the neo-con convention.

Anonymous

Are we talking about the legal or illegal hispanics who will vote legally or illegally in the next election?

Otohara1

Your horns are showing.

Anonymous

So you are in denial that there is voter fraud regarding illegals voting? Seriously? Google it.

Otohara1

Do yourself a favor and read about the supposed widespread voting fraud the new GOP SOS of Maine was so sure was happening, so they investigated and found nothing. There is no widespread voter fraud, Another manufactured crisis by an extreme party that is losing support and must disenfranchise in order to win. 91 year-old grannies are being denied a voter ID for not having a drivers license. Even our own SOS tried to deny soldiers a ballot if they didn’t vote in 2010. A whole slew of Denver voters, 56,000 were close to being disenfranchised until a judge stepped in.

Oh and that Acorn story is another big-fat-FOX lie. Even if they could, Acorn could never pull off getting 56,000 ” illegals ” to vote in one city. Wouldn’t you agree?

Breaking News… President Obama is ahead of Romney, and the rest of the GOP yahoos running in Arizona.

ARIZONA!!!

Anonymous

Here is a complete guid to ACORN Voter Fraud: http://pjmedia.com/blog/the-complete-guide-to-acorn-voter-fraud/ FYI: I don’t have cable so my facts don’t come from the Boob Tube namely FoxNews. However, since we’ve gotten on the slamming FoxNews bandwagon… how come they are have millions more viewers that any of the rest of cable combined? Could it be that most of the American public find Fox’s more conservative broadcasting more towards their belief systems? FYI: the Acorn story initially came from a non-FoxNews source. I am against any party resorting to proven or unproven voter fraud. I want a free and fair elections. But I don’t want foreign nationals of any nation voting in American elections.

Otohara1

Rolling out the tired, old and not true wingnut conspiracy that when Democrats win it’s because of voter fraud. The fraud is new GOP governors trying to disenfranchise students, minorities and the elderly. You know, like they did in Florida 2000.

Anonymous

And your tired old response that any challenge to voter fraud is “wingnut conspiracy” and that Acorn never helped Democrat’s in a suspected way is a denial of the truth. No one is trying to stop legal minorities from any of their rights afforded to them thru the local, state, and federal laws. I would think that any good Democrat would be against ANY voter fraud no matter who did it. I know I am. But the “hanging chads” issue is a left wing conspiracy and that’s still a sore spot with the left because the courts ruled in Bush’s favor. FYI: both Bush and Obama are big gov politicians. They really are on the same side. I didn’t support the first bailout/stimulus. But because that happen it cascaded into the debt mess we are in today. I don’t support big gov.

Anonymous

Are we talking about the legal or illegal hispanics who will vote legally or illegally in the next election?

Anonymous

One cannot move further left than Project New West. The poll results are predictable.and expected from such a group. My mother always told me to ‘consider the source’ when confronting unbelievable facts.

Lucy

I always thought the people in the west were fairly conservative. I guess too many of the liberals from California have moved out from California to get away from the illegals and oppressive taxation and taken root in Colorado and brought their liberal leanings with them.

Joey Bunch has been a reporter for 28 years, including the last 12 at The Denver Post. For various newspapers he has covered the environment, water issues, politics, civil rights, sports and the casino industry.